That's according to brokerage Cornish & Carey Commercial Newmark Knight Frank, which presented its annual Real Estate Review & Forecast on Wednesday. The event drew heavy hitters from local government, real estate, finance and construction to the Santa Clara Convention Center to hear from the brokerage that has had a hand in some of the biggest deals of the recent cycle.

"2010 through 2012 have been great years, and we're optimistic about 2013," said Charles Seufferlein, the brokerage's president and CEO. "None of us believe it will be the same type of year as it was last year, but we are optimistic things are going to hold."

Indeed, the Valley's commercial real estate market continued to build strength in 2012, thanks mostly to the tech sector. Total vacancy for Class A office space dropped to 9.9 percent from 11.9 percent a year earlier.

A vacancy rate below 10 percent is "a magic number for many in the lending community, and indicative of why you're seeing some construction happening now," Phil Mahoney, an executive vice president for Cornish & Carey, told attendees as part of his presentation.

Mahoney said gross office absorption in 2012, while down slightly from 2011, remained strong at about 8.9 million square feet, with net absorption rising slightly from the prior year to about 2.82 million square feet. Class A office rents were up 5 percent and 17 percent on the R&D side.

Major lease transactions during the year included the LinkedIn campus in Sunnyvale at 587,362 square feet and Lab126/Amazon.com deal, also in Sunnyvale, which weighed in at 581,973 square feet. And the brokerage is currently tracking more than 12.6 million square feet of tenant demand.

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